About the project

This project is presented under the European Commission call “EMFF-BEW-2019: BlueInvest Grants: Investing in Blue Innovation” of the “Blue economy window call”. The objective is to develop and bring to market new products, services, and business models for SMEs that could ultimately create profitable activities.

SATHScale strives to remove the main barriers for wind turbines installation on existing floating foundation concepts which are high capital and operating expenditures. For that reason, this project identifies and facilitates floating wind full scale technology industrialization which is crucial to drive the cost down for larger projects.

The project will contribute to develop local economies, reduce the offshore wind impacts and reduce the cost of energy even compared to fossil fuels.

Project Objectives

Reduce the investment costs and potential risks:
Develop an industrialized fabrication system for floating wind mass production, encompassing the manufacturing process, transportation and assembly.

Make floating offshore wind cost-competitive:
An automated production will ensure a significant cost reduction of floating wind substructures, through the optimization and standardization of the different parts and the use of local content.

Gather information and design optimization of the technology:
All data regarding the design process, tools, models and different aspects of the design will be gathered based on the real data obtained from the 2MW DemoSATH demonstrator.

Technology internationalization:
Offer a unique solution based on SATH Technology concept for offshore wind international markets.

Operations and maintenance improvement:
Demonstrator data collected by real-time condition monitoring systems, together with manual inspection data, will provide a full life-cycle view of the performance of the asset. This information will help to develop a maintenance strategy focused on reducing the need for routine activity. This means a consequent risk reduction, an improvement of health and safety and a reduction of unplanned activities and costs.

Project Structure

WP1: Management and Coordination

This work package has been designed to implement effective administrative and technical management procedures to implement the project and its successful execution.

WP2: Condition Monitoring Framework

It is about implementing a series of measures through sensors, data acquisition systems and communications, which allow monitoring of the prototype, with the aim of ensuring its integrity, characterizing its operation, and preventing failures, facilitating the design optimization when employing real loads compared to simulations.

WP3: Condition-Base Maintenance Framework

Condition Based Maintenance (CBM) is a predictive maintenance technique focusing on performing a maintenance action based on the actual condition of a system. It is based on monitoring the underlying deterioration process of the equipment.

WP4: Lifetime Offshore Operation Logistics

In the design process it is important to take into consideration marine operations for all the deployment stages of a floating wind farm: manufacturing, installation, operation, maintenance and decommissioning. In some cases, means and methods required can impose restrictions to the structure or the moorings design.

WP5: Design Optimization from real Experience Data

The optimization of the design with the actual load data vs the values obtained through conservative calculations. Important information about the design process, tools, models and different aspects of the design will be gathered and can be applied to the optimization of the technology in terms of cost and dynamic behaviour.

WP6: Industrialized Fabrication

Manufacturing gets more challenging as the size of the substructure increases (upscaling to +10MW wind turbines) mainly due to footprint (dimensions and weights). It is also an important that yards exist that can facilitate these requirements. Industrialization will require adaptation of existing Infrastructures and existing procedures. It is needed to maximise work shore side, reducing impact of weather and offshore working, allowing the use of local labour that facilitate stakeholder management with the importance this has for our clients in the development of projects.

WP7: Technology Internationalization

International markets for offshore wind comprise the opportunity space to commercialize SATH technology, that intends to cover not only the floating offshore market, but also to compete with bottom-fixed solution that currently monopolized the market. This global presence will allow SAITEC to develop a vast client network providing collaboration in both local and international markets with large construction companies and developers.

WP8: Dissemination and Exploitation

The objective of this work package is to prepare and put in place the required building blocks for commercialisation and to demonstrate the business case for the SATH floating platform. Ensure a maximum impact of the project (visible profile and that results from the research are properly disseminated to the public through project website, press-releases, newsletters and conference presentations/workshops).

Scaling-up SATH Technology

To achieve SATHScale goals, we will first validate SATH Technology in

real operating conditions. We will carry out the manufacturing, installing and operating of DemoSATH 2MW demonstrator that will be located in fully operational BiMEP open sea centre in the coast of Biscay (Spain).

Optimization of operations and maintenance logistics through data collection and analytics of real experiences will be gathered to achieve risk reduction (de-risk) of the technology innovations, improving health and safety and reducing unplanned activities and costs. At the same time, SATHScale will accelerate industrialization and commercialization of +10MW SATH Floating Platforms.

BiMEP test facilities

Once the DemoSATH is constructed, it will be towed to the installations of BIMEP.

BiMEP, Biscay Marine Energy Platform, is an infrastructure for testing prototypes of ocean energy collectors and auxiliary equipment on the open sea. It is located off the coast at Armintza, in the Basque Country.

It provides grid-connected offshore infrastructure and onshore facilities to support research, technical testing and commercial demonstration of pre-commercial prototype utilityscale MREDs.

Each berth is connected to the onshore substation via a dedicated three-phase submarine cable in series with a land three-phase line, both at 13.2 kV. The onshore electricity substation houses electrical protection systems, measurement systems and transformer, allowing the berths to be connected to the national power grid. The berths are designed to enable swift connection and disconnection of MREDs, thus reducing offshore work time as far as possible.